1. Open Adobe After Effects -> Create a New Project -> import my Shot.mov (, Thunder.wav and Wind.wav sounds into Project window. Or you can choose your own video and audio samples.

2. Creat a new Composition, name it Render and arrange it exactly as seen on the Image 1. - Don't forget to turn the Audio Levels slider down. "-10" for Wind.wav, "-20" for Thunder.wav. This way it will sound more balanced.

3. 3. Now create a new Adjustment Layer and name it Flash (select the layer and hit Enter). With the layer selected choose effect -> Color Correction -> Brigtness & Contrast. - Set "80" for Brightness and "50" for Contrast. This way, our lightning flash effect is ready. You can play with it, find other solutions, maybe add a bit of glow, but do it after you finish this tutorial. First understand the procedure.

4. Let's animate the effect according to the Thunder.wav sound. With the Thunder layer selected, right click -> Keyframe Assistant -> Convert Audio to Keyframes. - This option will create a new null layer, containing the amplitude data turned into keyframes. - Now, before you click it, make sure you MUTE the Wind.wav layer, because the option turns ALL THE AUDIO IN THE COMPOSITION into keyframes - and we want to use it just for Thunder layer. Therefore click it only with the Wind layer muted.

5. New layer called Audio Amplitude was created. - If you look at the effects it's containing (F3), you will see three of them - Left and Right Channel and Both channels. Go ahead and delete the Left and Right Channel. You can leave them, but I like getting rid of everything I don't need in the composition - and we won't use them. We will use just the Both Channels Slider. - Now, all we have is the Both Channels slider. If you select the Slider and click Graph Editor (see the image 2), you will see the audio amplitude turned into a keyframe graph.

6.Select the Both Channels effect in the Effect Controls window, hit Enter and name it "Brightness" (image 3). Now hit Ctrl+D and duplicate the effect. Name the second one "Contrast".

7. Now the things get a little tricky. We want to make these sliders control our two effects applied on the Flash Layer.- On the timeline, select the Flash Layer and hit E twice (or just open the small triangle on the left side of the layer). This opens the Brightness and Contrast sliders. - Hold down ALT and click on the Stop watch right next to the Brightness slider. This way we add Expressions to the layer. But don't worry, we're not going to write anything, just click on the little spiral icon called Pick whip and drag it over the Brightness Slider in the Audio Amplitude layer. See the image 4.- Do the same thing with the Contrast slider.- Now, the video should be flashing only a very, very little when the sound of lightning hits (to preview the video with sounds press Numpad 0). It really is almost unnoticeable, but don't worry, we'll correct it in the next step. Just make sure it's working.

8. The things are getting even trickier. The lightning flashes are now animated according to the sound, but they're animated just from 0-100% of the original value (= 80 for Brightness and 50 for Contrast). This is what makes it almost invisible. How to make the flashing grow linearily? We use expressions!- Click on the Audio Amplitude layer and hit E twice. This opens the sliders. - ALT click on the Brightness slider stop watch and type in the expression (you can simply delete the first one): "linear(value,0,100,0,1000)" (without quotation marks). Translation: When the Amplitude is 0 make it 0. When it's 100, make it 1000. Anything between those values will be then multiplied correctly.- Do the same thing with the Contrast slider. You can simply copy and paste the expression. (image 5)- The flashing should grow. If not, you did something wrong.

9. The effect is now complete. But the colors are somehow wrong. When there's a storm outside, it's usually cloudy, dark and all the colors slightly fade away. - Create a new Adjustment Layer, name it Filter. Right click on the layer, choose Effect -> Color Correction -> Hue/Saturation and turn the Master Saturation value down to -60.

10. You can RAM preview the video. It looks pretty good now, but we're still not done yet. The real lightning strikes only for a split second and it's gone. Our flash keeps flashing. - Select the Flash layer and hit T. This brings down the Opacity controller. On the timeline get to the point where the lightning hits for the last time (you can select the Thunder layer, hit L twice and then find the last widest point of the amplitude).- Hit the Opacity stop watch and set a keyframe to 100% (it already is set to 100%, just make sure the keyframe is created). - Go 12 frames forward and create another keyframe. Turn the Opacity down to 0%.

That's it. We've created a lightning flash in 10 steps. I hope you'll find this tutorial useful and use it in your movies. If you have a problem, just ask, if you don't want to ask, just go through my LightningFlash project. See you next time.

Friday, 27 February 2009

Today I tried to create an Audio Visualization effect using the VideoCopilot.net tutorial. Somehow I like the nebula-shaped waveform better, although I admit that its Audio motion is not that apparent.

Thursday, 26 February 2009

I made another video, this time testing my camera movement skill. This one is meant to be a DVD layout, but I wanted to show it here in motion.

Quick how to - Pivot:- in order to make the camera rotate the way it did (with an aditional XYZ axis movement) I didn't just use the Orbit Tool. I created a Null object and positioned it in the centre of the green particle nebula. Then I parented the Camera to the Null object and animated only the Null object. This way the Camera always rotated around the Null object centre, no matter where the Point of Interest was.If you need a tutorial, just send me a message and I'll see what I can do.

Tuesday, 24 February 2009

Brief How to:- for this AAE CS3 video I used CC Particle Systems II plugin - this way I created background bubbles as well as those that are emitted when the title hits the spot.- on top I added some Riot Gear bundle files from Videocopilot.net (special thanks goes to Andrew Kramer).- I also used Time Remapping in order to slow it down gradualy and then play it backwards.

I've spent a lot of time working with After Effects lately. And I mean A LOT of time...long nights especially. But it was great fun, definitely rewarding and worthwile. This video is a short show of some particle and 3d compositing effects, as well as my tribute to After Effects.

In case you'd be interested in having your very own fancy logo, just send me a message and I'll see what I can do.

This blog is not really meant to be about my movies, but I'll post some of my works anyway. Few years ago I created these two videos based on Star Wars universe. The first one was just a test of lightsaber effects. The second one is bigger and better - a short fanfilm.

I can sayy, that this is the best visual effects test I've done so far. It was summer, we were bored and I somehow came across this video - WoW: Wrath of the Lich King intro. And in that very moment I knew I have to shoot something similar.So basically, one day I had this idea, the second we went to shoot it. We had nothing: no original story, no fantasy equipment, not even a decent pair of boots (yeah, he wears trainers, we know).But I think it turned out pretty well.

And by the way - there's an improved version with better effects on its way. I'll surely post it when it's out.

There's one thing about blogs I know - the more you start posting in the beginning, the sooner you end. Therefore, I'm not going to type any sort of exhausting welcoming text. I'll just say:

Welcome,This is my visual effects blog.You'll find here some of the stuff I've created in Adobe After Effects.If things go well I might eventually add some tutorials. Which doesn't mean you can't ask "How did you do this and this?" sort of questions.